Bringing Back Chrono
by child-dragon
Summary: After Chrono died I always put Magus in the party, simply because he felt like the natural leader from that point on. This is just a short battle during the climb to save Chrono.


Magus stood in contemplation, watching the snow steam and crust with blood that spread from the crumpled figure at his feet. It was covered by a green wool cloak and the falling snow dotted like ash for a few seconds before melting. Magus knew that if he waited much longer the snow would cease to melt from the body heat, as there would no longer be a heart beating to provide that warmth. His eyes narrowed and a brief tug of the wind pulled his own hood back and exposed his pale face to the winter wind. It stung against his ears and eyes and he let it, the pain clearing his mind and letting him think.

If he let them die… any of them… it would not be a surprise. It was an uneasy truce and although a handful of them – well, Marle mostly – seemed to think that perhaps he really was their ally, the rest were aware that he would remain civil so long as they were useful and he could be useful to their cause. They'd know better than to put their lives in his hands. Willingly.

But this was unwilling. Magus knelt, pulling back the folds of the cloak to expose Frog's misshapen face, the wide lips parted softly and the eyes closed as he hovered between life and death, that line holding only so long as his lifeblood remained in his body. Magus put his knees in the snow, the cloth soaking through instantly, and used both hands to roll Frog onto his back and inspect the wound. Two spines had gone right in underneath the right arm, angled down so that they slid into the torso underneath his armor. Missed the heart, may have missed the lungs, but they were in deep.

"I owe you _nothing_," Magus hissed and wrapped one hand around the first spine and pulled. It came free and Frog shuddered, gasping at the sudden agony but not waking fully. Magus didn't give him time to register anything but tore the second one free as well and tossed it aside on the snow. Frog made a soft noise and fell still again.

Alive. Amazingly enough, alive. Magus had suspected the shock of removing the barbs alone would finish him off.

Very well then. There was still much to be done and he may as well finish what he'd started and save the idiot's life. The mage unclasped his belt pouch and removed a small vial, uncapping the cork and forcing the contents down Frog's lips. He stood then, tossing it aside violently and stepping back while the holes in Frog's body sizzled with the potion's work and he shuddered with sudden life being restored. It took a few more moments for Frog to regain consciousness and Magus used this to pull his hood back up against the cold and wrap his cloak closer around his body. Damned mountain weather would kill them all if they didn't get this over with.

Frog groaned and sat up, absently feeling at his side in surprise that he was still alive.

"You were knocked closest to me and since you weren't about to get back up I grabbed you and dragged you off to safety," Magus said flatly, "The beast still lives."

"Marle?"

He was staggering to his feet, casting about for his sword.

"I have no idea."

"Then we must-!"

"Rush in and die like blind idiots? By all means, I'll wait here and enjoy the show."

For a moment the two glared at each other. Frog, his manner blazing with righteous fury, uncaring about the cold or the wounds he'd just barely lived through – lived through only by the hand he least expected help from. And Magus, cold and distant and quietly contemplating, not whether Marle was alive or whether Frog was going to argue his tactics, but how exactly to approach the beast and finish it off. The Lavos-spawn. It was wounded but so were they. Magus kept his cloak close in part so that Frog couldn't see that he, too, was injured.

"Then what doth thou propose?" Frog finally asked. He was annoyed that he still couldn't locate his sword. Magus decided to let it go for a few more moments of irritation before telling him where it was.

"I'm still thinking."

"Marle lies dying!"

"She may already be dead!" Magus snapped, "You have your honor but I would sacrifice all of you a hundred times over to finish this and destroy Lavos. I have done such things before."

The reference to the war between the mystics and the humans from Frog's time forced him into brooding silence again; giving Magus the quiet he needed to think. A brilliant fighter, an honorable knight, but not a very good strategist. Far too noble to be able to calculate the odds and decide while a companion lay dying on the snowfield.

Hopefully not dying though. Magus had seen her get knocked into a pile of rocks in the blast and those had probably shielded her from the volley of spines the Lavos-spawn launched. If she were smart she would stay down and wait for him and Frog to make a move.

Marle wasn't very smart though, in Magus's opinion.

"Your sword is left behind on the battlefield," Magus finally said, "Stuck in the back of what we can assume that beast's neck is. I don't think you got past the shell very far before it threw you off."

Frog blinked. He must have blacked out somewhere around there.

"You landed near me and wasn't moving so I grabbed your cloak and dragged you back until the creature lost interest in pursuing," he finished, "I still have enough strength for a bit more magic so if you can somehow get close enough to shove your sword the rest of the way through the shell, that might finish it off."

"That is your plan?" Frog finally said. His voice was no longer resentful or angry – just a quiet acceptance that this was what he was to do. Magus cursed his nobility. He'd cursed it on some other snowy peak, at some other time, when the knight had sheathed his sword and spared his life.

No one could be that noble. And Magus was just waiting for Frog to fall and each time it failed to happen it felt like a small needle of pain was driven deeper into him. No one could be so noble, to set the sword aside at the last moment, when Magus was at his weakest and already prepared to die so that the old grievance may be settled.

If Frog slipped – if any of them did for just a moment – then perhaps there wouldn't be such a distance between him and then.

"It is. Let's go."

He walked. A testament to how tired he was – this climb had worn him out both physically and mentally and he was reserving as much strength as he could. Levitation was a luxury he couldn't afford to indulge in right now. The frog didn't seem to notice, or care. Up ahead he could see his own footprints, half-covered by the slight trench Frog's body had made behind him. There was a bend in the rocks and beyond that would be a clearing. Magus paused and heard the ponderous shuffling of the Lavos-spawn.

"Five seconds, then go," Magus whispered and Frog nodded.

His scythe was gods knew where. He'd dropped it in favor of grabbing the damn frog. But he wouldn't need it, as he wasn't planning on getting anywhere close to the creature. Frog could go and get himself impaled. That was what honorable fools were good for, apparently.

Magus stepped around the bend. The creature had its back to him, the hilt of Frog's sword glinting in the air like a totem, and he could see curled in a small wedge of rock a human-shaped lump of white cloak. Marle. The figure moved briefly and her blue eyes caught his. He nodded, slightly, and stepped forward, softly, spreading his hands to either side. The Lavos-spawn stopped moving, sensing the attacker behind it.

Far too late, of course. Magus snapped his hands together, pouring the shadow magic through his veins and into his hands, the very light around him draining away to give berth to the magic he commanded. He snapped out the words of the incantation and gestured. The ground ruptured with dark energy, like it was pulling itself out of the very earth, and gathered into a nebulous ball just over the Lavos-spawn. Frog went running past Magus, nearly on all fours. Then the ball exploded and dark power spat out in a shock wave that engulfed the Lavos-spawn and made it shriek in agony.

Magus smiled. There was no visible damage to the creature but that was the beauty of shadow magic. It was all internal. All invisible, all damage done to the inside of the body and to the ties that held soul to flesh.

Frog leapt, landing on the creature's back and Marle staggered out of hiding, gesturing and chanting as well. Healing the brave idiot before the Lavos-spawn managed to impale him again. But Frog put both hands on the hilt of the sword and slammed it down with the full force of his strength. The crack of shell and spine was audible and the death scream made Marle shriek and throw her hands over her ears. Frog just wrenched the sword free and leapt back onto the snow, panting. Magus did not stir.

The three waited until the air was silent again, the scream carried away on the wind, before they moved. Marle walked over to the rest, pulling back the hood of her cloak and shaking the snow off the hem. Little puffs of crystallized breath showed just how fast she was breathing and how scared she had been.

"You shouldn't keep a lady waiting!" she said, eyeing them both.

"My apologies," Frog murmured and bowed his head.

Magus just stared at her until she looked away. He knew what she was thinking. Making light of the situation. As if she hadn't been huddled in that notch where the Lavos-spawn couldn't reach, healing her injuries, and wondering if Frog was dead. If Magus was going to come back for her.

"It was prudent to retreat for the moment," Magus said calmly, "I couldn't heal Frog without exposing myself."

Marle lunged and snatched hold of his cloak, pulling it aside and revealing the armor that lay beneath. He made a move to rip it back out of her hands but she had already slammed her palm into his stomach and he grunted, involuntarily, with pain.

"You don't retreat unless you have to," she said, "I'm not stupid."

Blood seeped out from the armor and onto Marle's palm. She chanted, briefly, and the warmth of her magic slipped into the injuries and knitted them closed. Mostly internal. Magus closed his eyes briefly, his head swimming with the sudden absence of pain. Then she let go of him, paused, and wiped his blood off her hands with the edge of his cloak, staring up into his eyes as she did so, as if daring him to protest.

"Would it kill you to show a bit of humanity?" she demanded, "You run yourself into the ground refusing to admit you're hurt like that."

"Humanity?" he said, his voice carefully casual, "I don't know. I've never tried."

He walked away to leave her wondering if he were joking or not. Of course he had emotions. He had his pride, he had a loss as strong as what Marle had when that stupid red-haired boy sacrificed his life, and he had his thirst for revenge. He had his temper. An awful, brutal temper that he kept in careful check. In these ways he truly wasn't so different from them. The means, however… those were different. And that was why each time Marle or any other tried to comprehend – or befriend him – they'd fall short for they missed where the distinction lay.

Same ends. Different means.

"We can shove the shell of that thing against the cliff," Magus commented, surveying their path forward, "Use it to climb up. I'm assuming scaling ice-coated cliff edges wasn't part of your royal upbringing, Princess."

"It wasn't," Marle replied, "Frog? Help me?"'

It took Magus's help as well but he gave it and they did not ask for it. Frog went first, Magus commenting that he'd best be careful to not skewer himself – again. He only had so many potions on him. Marle went second and Magus climbed close behind, half-levitating up and only faking the climb so that she wouldn't catch on to the fact that he was in reality watching to see if she would fall.

Thankfully, she didn't, and the three made it to the ledge. The peak was in sight – still a ways off – but in sight now.

"Chrono," Marle whispered, seeing the same thing that the other two had, "We're coming."

The wind picked up and Magus tugged his hood back up to cover his ears from the bitter cold. It was so important for them. They had their friendships, their loves, homes, and ideals. Magus didn't have much of anything, a fact he was keenly aware of. In some ways, that made it easier. Failure meant less.

Marle led, Frog close beside her. Magus did not move for a few moments, letting them get some distance on him. He was tired, worn out from so much magic during the long climb. The aftereffects numbed the veins and it was hard to fight off the chill that surrounded him. Still. One of the things he had left was his pride. And even if Marle had to beat an admittance of hurt out of him he'd keep it to the last. He ducked his head against the wind and resumed the climb, trailing along behind the group.

Maybe they'd succeed. Get the brash, stupid, red-haired one back. That'd be some victory, at least. It'd be a nice change. None of his attempts seemed to have amounted to any success.

Not that he'd admit his failures to anyone but himself. He had his pride and not much more.


End file.
